One document and records control procedure for an integrated ISO 9001:2015 and ISO 14001:2026 quality and environmental system. Forty-four pages. Quality and environment under a single document and records control process, written as one document rather than two merged. Where the two standards agree, one control serves both. Where they differ, the procedure takes the stricter requirement as its house standard and records the decision.
Both standards place documented information at Clause 7.5 and ask closely similar things of it, which is why one procedure serves both. ISO 9001 carries the larger records inventory across the whole of its Clause 8; ISO 14001 adds the environmental aspects and the compliance-obligations register that must be kept as both a live document and a retained record. This procedure resolves each difference and records it.
44 pages, editable Word | 43 clauses cross-referenced | 16 MSI notes in the margin | 5 appendices, every one usable |
The integration is the product. Appendix D is an integration decision record — every place ISO 9001 and ISO 14001 diverge, what this procedure does about it, which standard is the house rule, and the alternative that was rejected. Assembling that table is the work a buyer cannot easily do alone, and running two separate procedures avoids it only by leaving the divergences unresolved.
01
ISO 14001 requires you to maintain a register of environmental compliance obligations and to retain evidence of them. That means holding the current register and every superseded version, so you can always show which requirements applied to you at any past date. A register kept only as a live document loses that history the moment it is updated. This procedure treats it as document-and-record from the start.
02
The first act for any document or record is deciding whether it is quality, environmental, or both. That determination drives retention and control for the life of the item. The procedure opens with a three-way determination and a rule that anything ambiguous defaults to the stricter treatment, because it is cheaper to over-control a shared record than to under-control an environmental one.
03
The 2026 edition of ISO 14001 adds a dedicated clause for planning of changes. A change to the environmental management system is assessed before it is made, and this procedure routes that assessment through its change process like any other controlled change — so the requirement is met by the procedure rather than bolted on afterward.
Every appendix, form and worked example is part of the document. Nothing is sold separately.
Quality and environmental managers at organizations running an integrated quality-and-environmental system — certified to both standards, pursuing either, or running the combined system to the standards without a certificate. Particularly useful where separate quality and environmental procedures have drifted apart and now disagree about change control or retention.
Not sure where your process stands? The free Document and Records Control Maturity Check scores it across eight elements in about six minutes, and your score appears without entering anything.
Preparing for a certification or surveillance audit?
MSI’s QMS Interviews course prepares your team for the conversations an auditor will actually have with them — and in an integrated quality-and-environmental system, one question about a shared record can touch both standards at once. That is where document control findings most often originate.
Both, deliberately. It is written as a filled-in worked example so you can see what each element looks like when done properly, with bracketed placeholders wherever a value is genuinely yours to set. You are editing a working document rather than filling in a hollow outline.
Because two separate procedures — one to ISO 9001, one to ISO 14001 — that disagree about change control or retention are worse than either alone, and they drift apart within about a year. Both standards share the Clause 7.5 structure, so a single integrated document is genuinely one procedure. Appendix D records every point where the two differ and how it was resolved.
As both a document and a record. The current register is the live document; every superseded version is retained, so you can always demonstrate which obligations applied at any past date. That dual treatment is exactly what ISO 14001 asks for and what a register kept only as a working document fails to provide.
No. Nothing here assumes a certificate to either. An organization running an integrated quality-and-environmental system because it is the sensible way to work uses this the same way. If you are certified to one and pursuing the other, the procedure already covers both scopes.
Editable Microsoft Word (.docx). Adapt it, rebrand it, and adopt it into your own document control system. The license permits the buying organization to use it across its own sites and issue it to employees, contractors and auditors, and permits consultants to adapt it for engagements they deliver.
A procedure does not pass an audit; an organization does. What this gives you is a procedure that addresses every requirement of every standard it covers with a named owner and a named record, every divergence between the standards resolved and recorded, and a records inventory with no blanks. Conformity is demonstrated by implementation and evidence. Unfilled placeholders are unmet requirements, so fill them.
Need more than one procedure?
This is one procedure from a larger library. If you are building or maintaining a full documentation system, view the complete ISO 9001 & ISO 14001 (Q/EMS) package — the procedures, guides and tools assembled together.
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The procedure is written throughout for a fictional organization called Perennia Corp, used for illustration and not connected with any real organization of the same or a similar name. Replace it with your own name and work through the bracketed placeholders. This is a professional work product provided for adaptation and use within your organization. It is not a certification requirement, an audit checklist, or a substitute for the applicable standards, the applicable regulations, or the judgment of a competent professional. © Management Systems International, LLC. All rights reserved.
